I honestly wish you were right that nobody cared. That would mean that homophobia and prejudice against gays was a thing of the past. Unfortunately, given some of the anti-gay reaction on social media and from leaders in backwards countries like Russia and Saudi Arabia, it's clear that's not the case.

Silly me. I thought that putting ideas out for peer/public review and genuinely listening to the logic (or lack thereof) behind criticisms and opposing ideas was the way one gets to the truth (i.e. dialectical method). At least, that's the way knowledge and ideas are validated in academia. But I guess when one truly believes that they're omnipotent (or has some sort of unquestionable divine justification), there's no need for it.

Then why did god create a wide spectrum of sexual orientation in a number of species throughout the animal kingdom (humans included) as can be proven by scientific evidence? Was he/she just trying to mess with us? Or was perhaps that sin invented by bigoted human beings?

To all the people in the other threads who maintained that "there's no risk" in coming out these days, or that it was done for his own benefit somehow, I give a resounding: ha!
Just because you don't see prejudice in your own little corner of the world, or because you're not part of a minority, doesn't mean that it has gone away. And this thread is even further proof of that.

Agreed. But coming back to my original point, they don't all fit under the survival umbrella. I think the fundamental problem I have with the notion that all actions are done in the name of self-interest is that it's a completely superfluous statement if the definition of self-interest is simply things one is interested in. What you're essentially saying is that all actions are done in the name of being interested in them. Well of course they are. But if the definition...

Once you change to use the categorization of "needs" instead of "necessities for survival", you've broken the logical connection that makes one group the same as the other. If we're going to discuss it in terms of the "pyramid of needs" (which is again a social theory and not a scientifically provable fact), the needs which fit into a higher level of the pyramid are not the same as the needs which fit into a lower level. This is what forms the distinction between...

So if Tim Cook's public coming out is driven by self-interest, and self-interest is the same as survival instinct, then explain to me how Cook's survival depends on this action? One could actually make a good case for the reverse: his survival could potentially be threatened by this action if he travelled to certain areas of the world.

I've repeated it many times throughout this thread, but I'll try this time very plainly and directly in bold and see if it sinks in for those who can't comprehend things outside of their own experience: The reason Tim Cook's openly stating that he's gay is important is because there are many other gay men who are currently experiencing discrimination in the world because of their sexual orientation. By having someone of his stature openly state this, it could have many...

Ah yes, naturally someone who blindly follows the faith of Capitalist philosophy would argue the world is innately that way. I've studied Adam Smith, Thomas Hobbes, and the other social and economic philosophers who helped form the foundations of modern Capitalism too. People who subscribe to that that faith without question no different from those on the other side of the fence who take Marx and Engels as the gospel truth on how the world works. They just continue to...